Emergency Preparedness Leader with strong communication skills for a newly created position in the Health and Care Administration

Are you ready to lead from the front and take responsibility for others in crisis situations?

Do you have professional ambitions to help establish a strong and collaborative emergency preparedness organization in the City of Copenhagen?

Do you see an important task in helping to create a common language for criticality across Copenhagen Municipality's seven departments?

And can you act proactively on critical incidents in crisis situations?

So please read on!

About the job

As an emergency manager in the Health and Care Administration (SUF), City of Copenhagen, you will be responsible for the department’s crisis preparedness. This applies to both the strategic, tactical and operational level. The responsibility includes all our nursing homes, as well as home care which takes care of citizens who live in their own homes and will also need help during an emergency crisis. To succeed, close collaboration with among others principals, home care managers and other actors is crucial.

In addition, you will play an important role in helping to build a strong and future-proof emergency preparedness organization across the City of Copenhagen. This happens in collaboration with the municipality’s other emergency preparedness leaders, who represent each administration.

At the overall level you will have professional responsibility to strengthen

• tactical emergency management, professional and organizational leadership of SUF's overall emergency preparedness, including development and maintenance of comprehensive emergency plans, implementation of national and regional requirements, and advising the corporate management on risks and preparedness.
• crisis management and operational control, for both major and minor incidents, ensuring clear command structures and decision-making processes, and planning and conducting exercises and scenario training
• organizational robustness and ongoing development, including developing common procedures for major incidents, supporting among others principals and home care managers in emergency and crisis management, ensuring cross-organizational collaboration on emergency issues, and systematic follow-up and learning after any incidents
• taking on the leadership task implies that you as a people leader will build a new unit (in growth), and will further develop structures, processes and collaborations across the administration and the entire municipality, while creating coherence between the strategic and the operational, and together with the centre head you contribute to the executive and political committee having good opportunities to set a strategic direction for the emergency preparedness area

SUF has for many years worked on developing a strong emergency response, but the ambitions go further than that. The City of Copenhagen has, in collaboration with an external consultancy, prepared a thorough analysis which, among other things, identifies the municipality’s critical tasks in the event of crises, and how we as a municipality should act timely and correctly. The analysis contributes to a common managerial basis for the municipality’s work with resilience in the future.

In addition to a common solid picture of Copenhagen Municipality's emergency preparedness situation, a number of initiatives have been developed to be implemented by 2030.

You can expect that you and the staff in the emergency area will physically sit together with colleagues from the other six administrations several days a week, and the remaining time with SUF in Telehuset at Borups Allé 41.

The first period

After a planned introduction, in the short term you will need to create an overview and insight into the area, including understanding the establishment of a common and binding crisis and emergency management organization for the entire City of Copenhagen, while you learn the organization and partners. It is necessary that you build and maintain close relations with principals and home care managers. At the same time as you start the job, you must in close collaboration with two employees ensure coordination and progress in planned actions.

In the longer term you will contribute to ensuring that Copenhageners live safely and with confidence that the civilian emergency preparedness in the capital is functioning well.

About you

We imagine that you have a relevant long-term education, and in addition you have substantial experience with crisis and emergency planning, including handling emergencies. It will be an asset if you have a strong understanding of the health and care sector's operations, including collaboration with public and private actors. Perhaps this is your first leadership job – we do not require a formal leadership education. You

• are able to work in a coordinating, structured and systematic way
• have breadth – i.e., you are used to and have experience moving across the different organizational levels in an organization, and can move from operational to being able to articulate your more long-term considerations in connection with a unified emergency plan
• have well-developed and particularly good communication skills with a high degree of integrity, which you use in collaboration with many different internal and external partners
• perceive yourself as mentally robust and not easily knocked down when it gets tough – you navigate and collaborate with many different stakeholders, and you stand firm in your professional field
• therefore you must be strong in building relationships, good collaboration interfaces, actively contribute to cross-organizational cooperation and, not least, be able to see yourself as an important part of a politically governed organization

In addition you will have an independent role in the organization, which means that together with the staff you will find the best possible solutions. Since this is a newly created job function, you will have a high degree of influence over your job. In addition to political attention, you can expect support from the organization.

About us and the administration

The Emergency Department will be one of three departments in the Center for Quality and Emergency Preparedness, where you will join a management team consisting of three department heads and a center chief. In addition to the Emergency Department, the center consists of the Department of Quality and Citizen Safety and the Department of Data and Analytics.

In SUF we must ensure that the organization’s about 420 managers and about 11,000 employees have the best conditions to deliver high-quality services and care to citizens. The administration accounts for about 10 percent of all elderly care in Denmark. Our size imposes responsibilities, and it is therefore a natural ambition for us to create solutions of such high quality that we shape the national agenda in the elderly and health sector for the benefit of citizens, both locally and nationally.

Read more here about your development opportunities and everyday life as a leader in SUF .

Salary and employment terms

The job is 37 hours per week. Start date 1 December 2026. Salary and employment are according to the applicable collective agreement and negotiated according to qualifications. We collect references and a criminal record check on applicants who are considered for a job offer.

Further information

You are welcome to contact center chief Thomas Tarp Thorgaard at 60 45 64 14 for further information or questions.

Apply via the link no later than Sunday 18 October 2026

We will hold 1st interviews on Wednesday 21 October and 2nd interviews on Wednesday 28 October. Candidates advancing to the 2nd interview should expect to complete a test process including a case, which is part of the overall assessment.

About the Health and Care Administration

Our everyday life is about people. See more about our everyday life at www.vores-hverdag.kk.dk .